Diversity, equality & fairness

We all have a responsibility to treat each other fairly and with respect, no matter what our colleagues’ race, age, gender, sexuality, disability or religious beliefs.
 
We recognise that different people have different needs, and are able to contribute in different ways. We promote behaviours and working practices which recognise and value the difference between people, and help them to fulfil their potential.

Race and ethnicity

Our workforce is diverse in terms of race and ethnicity, reflecting the communities in which our people live and work. Over 13 per cent of our workforce comes from a black and minority ethnic (BME) background, which is slightly above the portion of BME citizens in the UK as a whole.

Gender balance

At present, women represent 16 per cent of our workforce. As an equal opportunities employer, we encourage our female employees to consider management roles. Currently, 20% of our managers are women.

Our Springboard Development Programme aims to help non-management female employees into junior management. It focuses on women in ‘frontline’ roles, to develop their self-confidence, goal-setting and personal skills.

Women across the organisation also benefit from our Women’s Network, set up to support the professional development of our female staff. This includes a mentoring scheme, led by our Chief Executive Moya Greene, for women at junior management level.

Royal Mail Group is a key supporter of Business in the Community (BITC) “Opportunity Now”. We won silver in the 2011 awards, which celebrate excellent workplace practices with a focus on gender.

Disadvantaged

Royal Mail diversity includes disadvantaged people. We are committed to recruiting and offering placement opportunities to people from socially excluded backgrounds.

We have been a national partner of BITC’s Business Action on Homelessness programme since 2005.

We also work with Remploy, which helps people with disabilities and health conditions rejoin the workplace. Working with Remploy, Royal Mail was one of only three companies to place 500 people with disabilities in our workforce in a single year. At present, seven per centof our employees consider themselves to have a disability.

Training for all

We strive to ensure that every employee gets the training they need to do their job to a high standard. In 2010-2011, 65,000 Royal Mail Group employees experienced formal training. We provide 30-minute Work Time Listening and Learning sessions for frontline employees once a week.An integral part of WTLL is RMTV - Royal Mail’s TV news programme, which offers a weekly round-up of the latest on our business, customers, people and community news.

Engaging everyone

We are also committed to giving all our employees a say on matters relating to Royal Mail Group. We recently launched an Employee Engagement survey in an effort to get every employee’s views on our organisation, which will lead to action planning to improve things.

By treating all our employees equally and fairly, we will help them to help us transform our business and deliver an outstanding service to our customers.

Whatever their differences, our people share an enthusiasm for working for Royal Mail Group, and are genuinely passionate about its heritage, its future, our customers and the service we provide.